, 1887-11-01
DRINKS OF ALL NATIONS.
THE EASILY GOVERNED NATIONS
DRINK NO STRONG LIQUORS.

lions
Taken all in all, perhaps the English
residents in India spend more money for
drink than any other people in the world.
Plenty of people are, of course, ready to
condemn his sort Of thing, and say the
Anglo-Indians ought to qucnch their thirst
with non-intoXicants. More lemonade and
less brandy and champagne, it is claimed,
would materially lessen the rate of NOR.
tality from enlarged spleen, the banc of
Anglo-Indian life. This may be strictly
true, but the fact remains that a mere
handful of hard drinking Britons are, adj
ministcring the affairs of 200, 900, COO prac-
tically non-drinking people.
Some of the natives of India consume
more or less Grrack and palm toddy, but
the Brahmins, the g%entlest and easiest
governed people in the world, drink moth
ing stronger than water. The ONLY tribe
of people in India who drink to excess nrc
the Eats of the Punjab. The festive .Jat
gets drunk on arrack, and indulge in
manly sports like a civilized being. On
the field of battle he is equal to a round
dozen non-drinking Hindoos, and forms
today the flower of the native British-in
dim army. He it was that stood firmly
by the English during the mutiny, and
performed prodigies of valor scarcely
second to Tommy Atkins himself. He
calls the water drinking natives of Dude
and Bengal ''poorbcahs," and is superior
to them in every manly attribute.
In MOhammedan countries very little
alcohol is consumed in proportion to the
number of people. The Koran denies the
seductive pleasures of its material para
disc to Mussulmans who indulge in the
flowing BOWL of Bacchus here below. The
Shiahs are considered the Catholics of the
Mohammedan religion. The whole Per
sian nation belong to the Shah faith. Its
Io,OOO OOO of people are governed with the
same ease as the same number of sheen
might be by a few officials who care moth
ing for their welfare except to Squeeze
them like an orange whenever they feel
like it. The 5000, 600 never touch any
thing Intoxicating from one years end 10
another. The governing few consume raw,
fiery arrack by the pint daily in wanton
disregard of the Koran and its teachings.
The village khan and subordinate COVER
nor OF Il province keeps by him a stock of
nrrack and drinks from half a pint TO n
pint with his midday meal to stimulate
his appetite and make himself feel boozy
while eating, and is frequently put to bed
limp as a dishrag by his retaincrs at night.
The Japs are the most encouraging eX-
amples that the east presents of a nation
progressing from Asiatic to an European
plane of civilization. They bid fair ere
many years TO be more European in their
habits than the majority of Europeans
themselves. One wouldn't care to assert
that the vast quantity of sake consumed
by the japanese has anything to do with
their superiority in this particular over all
other Asiatics. l am merely pointing out
facts, leaving the reader to draw his or her
own conclusions therefrom.
No nation in Asia drinks so persistcnflv
and steadily as do the Japanese. The
average Jap consumes about hnlf {. pint
of sake or rice beer with each meal-a
pint and a half per day-saying nothing
about further social indulgence in the
evening. Both men and women drink
sake by the pint daily, and think no harm
OF 1t, either. AT meal times the sake is
served up in slender, big necked earthen-
ware bottles, holding about a pint. The
favorite way is to drink it warm. 1t is
usually warmed by setting the bottle in
boiling water for a while before putting it
on the table. Rice beer is a rather de-
ceptive name to give sake, as it resembles
liquor more than beer, both in color, con-
sistency and intoxicating property. In
the consumption of alcohol the Japs, rs o
nation, rank way ahead OF any other
Asiatic country. In addition to sake,
they are also rapidly coming to the fore
as of beer and brandy and
~ '''NJ an consumption Vi lltSb
beverages keeps n curiously even pace
with their progression toward what we
are pleased to consider our W higher
plane of civilization. When they first be-
gan to think of wearing European clothes
they Contented themselves with import
ing French brandy and English and Mil
waukee beer. Now, however, the gov
eminent compels all its officials to adopt
European clothes, and the upper crust So
nfaf ~ nj 1fp1yfn nra Tow Fr.-. III H. =
Europeanizing their habits and costumes.
Consequently the Japs have commenced
brewing their own beer and making a
very good imitation of French brandy.
The Chinese as n nation consume very
little Intoxicating drink, although they
make a beverage from rice called "~torri''
almost the counterpart of the axe Of
Japan. Whenever there has been wal
between the two nations the Japs nave in
yariably walloped John Chinaman almost
as thoroughly as the arrack drinking Jats
of the Punjab were wont to make things
warm for the total a~bstaining Hindoos in
'57, and before.
The Turks are a nation that drink next
to nothing of u stimulating character, I'M
less tiny cups of strong black coffee may
be so considered. AS Mohammedans they
are less sanctimonious but more consistent
than the Persians. The Osmanli official
sometimes lnuulBeS -maStlC, but II he
does, he consumes 1t in the guise of medi-
cine, the prohibitive voice of the Koran
not including alcohol used as medicine.
The Turks are brave and warlike, and if,
when their star of empire was in the
ascendancy and their crescent banner
Coated over half Europe, they had for
sakcn the prohibitive tenets of the Koran
and went into brewing and drinking beer
and whisky, who knows but that they
might be occupying Moscow today instead
of being bulldozed by the Russians2
The Russians are a nation of hard
drinkers. Vodka is consumed by the Mus
covite peasantry in vast quantities. The
moujik's idea of n holiday is to get skin
full of vodka, and then lay down and
hang IN to the ground. This laudable
performance is gone through with by the
Russian peasant as often as he can pro-
cure the necessary quantity Of vodka. He
has n saints day to keep almost three
hundred and sixty-five times a year, and
the only thing that prevents him from
celebrating every one of them by filing
himself up with vodka is the necessity OF
making his living and the lack of money
to thus indulge his appetite. With all
this one would naturally expect to find
the county going to the devil and dete-
rioration. This fate, however, we find
,a-Ar,r- to tLa q III